According to a report from industry insiders, Samsung beat Apple's third quarter results for smartphone sales for the first time. According to Apple's most recent earnings report, they sold 17.1 Million iPhones in Q3. Samsung doesn't publish specific smartphone sales numbers; however, a source from the WSJ was able to tally up the results and put the Korean manufacturer at over 20 Million smartphones for the same period.

The last sales report in quarter 2 was very close with Samsung coming just shy of matching Apple's numbers, so this new report isn't surprising. Here's a quote from the SlashGear article with Apple's CEO Tim Cook's take on the subject,

Apple CEO Tim Cook blamed media hype around the iPhone 5 earlier this week for the company’s performance in Q3, which fell short of market expectations. Speaking during the financial results call, Cook suggested that “speculation reached extreme highs” about the prospect of a considerably redesigned iPhone featuring, among other things, a larger display and an all-metal, teardrop shaped casing. Apple CFO Peter Oppenheimer later insisted that the “biggest impact [on performance] was the rumors, which were very pervasive.”

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With the recent announcement of the Galaxy Nexus and Google's Ice Cream Sandwich, Samsung's market pressure will only continue to mount against Apple.

These results from both Samsung and Apple have firmly shoved Nokia, once the largest cellphone manufacturer in the world, into third place. In fact, Nokia's sales for the third quarter slid dramatically downward by 38 percent. Nokia is banking on the idea that the Windows Phone 7 OS will rescue them.

Makes sense. I'm sure that a bunch of folks held off of bying the iPhone 4 during Q3 in anticipation of the 4S being released in October, which falls in Q4. Apple was at its most vulnerable at the same time that Samsung's popular Galaxy S II was selling around the world and debuted in the US.

Car makers do the same thing - dealers buy it so shipped and sold are the same thing and the mfr targets a certain days on-hand in inventor, unless inventory is building beyond normal turnover shipped vs sold is just a timing difference. And, no, I don't see hundreds or thousands of Sammie phones sitting in warehouses or being given away. Sammie has been gaining ground on IPhone fast, and while I doubt they passed them this quarter, it will happen soon.

Car makers do the same thing - dealers buy it so shipped and sold are the same thing and the mfr targets a certain days on-hand in inventor, unless inventory is building beyond normal turnover shipped vs sold is just a timing difference. And, no, I don't see hundreds or thousands of Sammie phones sitting in warehouses or being given away. Sammie has been gaining ground on IPhone fast, and while I doubt they passed them this quarter, it will happen soon.

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Well to be fair no one really sees a store's stock and I know I've never visited warehouses that hold phones. Samsung definitely sold a lot, but I find it hard to believe they sold 17 mil in a quarter...I don't really give them the benefit of the doubt after the galaxy tab thing. Remeber they said they sold two million and when pressed admitted that was shipments and had only sold a few thousand. See no reason why this would be different.

Well to be fair no one really sees a store's stock and I know I've never visited warehouses that hold phones. Samsung definitely sold a lot, but I find it hard to believe they sold 17 mil in a quarter...I don't really give them the benefit of the doubt after the galaxy tab thing. Remeber they said they sold two million and when pressed admitted that was shipments and had only sold a few thousand. See no reason why this would be different.

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Sales never trail shipments by much. They just don't. Samsung doesn't just ship Best Buy whatever Sammie wants to, and Best Buy doesn't get to send back hundreds of thousands of devices that don't sell. You order it you bought it.

And this is an analyst (granted, they do miss the mark more than occassionally) extrapolating sales from what I would guess would be segment (smartphone) revenues/profits.

Sales never trail shipments by much. They just don't. Samsung doesn't just ship Best Buy whatever Sammie wants to, and Best Buy doesn't get to send back hundreds of thousands of devices that don't sell. You order it you bought it.

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who ever said they were being shipped to retailers.... all shipped means is that they left the manufacturing warehouse. In most cases they were shipped from the manufacturer to Samsung warehousing facilities all over the world.

who ever said they were being shipped to retailers.... all shipped means is that they left the manufacturing warehouse. In most cases they were shipped from the manufacturer to Samsung warehousing facilities all over the world.

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No, shipped has a fairly precise and generally accepted meaning when reporting financials. "Shipped" means to wholesalers/distributors/customers, not your own warehouse. Your definition of shipped is no different from production - there's a reason they are referring to units shipped rather than produced.

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